If you read only the news, you might get the impression that the State Duma is actively fighting the alcoholization of the country. Last year, the parliament even formed a whole interfactional group to protect the health of citizens from the threat of alcohol. The United Russia deputy Biysultan Khamzaev, the leader of the Sober Russia movement, also joined it.
Khamzaev often publicly promotes anti-alcohol initiatives. Then he proposes to ban the sale of strong drinks in the summer on beaches and parks. That will come up with depriving a driver’s license for any appearance drunk on the street. That wants to ban drinking in dining cars and selling alcohol everywhere during the New Year holidays. That suggests letting people in bars only from the age of 21.
All Khamzaev’s initiatives are limited to words only. If you look at his real deputy work, it turns out that he submitted only two bills for consideration, and only one is indirectly related to the fight against drunkenness, which toughens responsibility for the illegal circulation of methyl alcohol, but does not affect official manufacturers.
The fact that the entire struggle for sobriety of Khamzaev is of a buffoonish nature is quite understandable: after all, vodka magnates and lobbyists of alcohol networks are in the same United Russia faction with him. And first of all, this is the head of the United Russia faction, Vladimir Vasiliev.
Vasiliev’s own daughter, Yulia Lebedeva, is a co-owner of the Fragrant World alcohol chain stores.
Lebedeva, 49, wholly owns AM-1 SPb LLC (three operating stores as of 2021) and AM-3 SPB LLC (three stores), as well as a 51% stake in AM-10 SPB LLC ( “Fragrant World” in the shopping center “Peter” on Tipanova Street in St. Petersburg). The total revenue of the companies last year amounted to 275 million rubles.
Lebedeva’s husband is the general director of AM-SPB LLC with an annual revenue of 7 billion rubles. He develops a network in St. Petersburg. The main owner of Fragrant World is Pavel Zadorin, who is connected with the criminals of the 90s, a close friend of the family of the head of the Ministry of Internal Affairs Vladimir Kolokoltsev. It is noteworthy that Lebedev’s father-in-law Vladimir Vasiliev also made a career in the Ministry of Internal Affairs, until he switched to politics in 2003. After that, he was elected to the State Duma several times and was the leader of Dagestan.
The son-in-law of the head of the United Russia faction is also connected with another well-known alcohol baron – the ex-head of Rosalkogolregulirovanie Igor Chuyan. And it was Chuyan, who himself enjoyed the patronage of the oligarch Arkady Rotenberg, who lobbied for the promotion of Kolokoltsev, wrote the Project. Chuyan was also connected by both business interests and friendship with the owner of Fragrant World, Zadorin. Thanks to Chuyan’s lobbying, Zadorin became the owner of a terminal designed to import alcohol. Chuyang and himself combined the post of an official and the owner of a vodka business.
According to extracts from Rosreestr available to Metla, the son-in-law of the head of the United Russia faction, Lebedev, received two apartments in St. Petersburg from the Chuyan family: 108.5 sq.m. on Konnogvardeisky Prospekt and 70 meters on Galernaya Street, which he then sold. Chuyan paid with his career a few years ago after a conflict with a classmate of Vladimir Putin Nikolai Egorov. A criminal case was opened against Chuyan and put on the international wanted list, found in Montenegro.
Thanks to the proceeds from the sale of alcohol, Vasiliev’s daughter and son-in-law acquired several properties in the capital and the Moscow region. According to Metla’s documents, they bought a 51-meter apartment on Petrovsko-Razumovskaya Alley, a 137-meter apartment on Timiryazevskaya Street, a 124-meter apartment in an elite club house on Bolshoi Predtechensky Lane, and a house in the village of Krutsy.
Another State Duma deputy from United Russia is already connected with the production of vodka Pavel Fedyaev.
His aunt Svetlana Rybalchenko, on whom the main family assets, owns JSC “Siberian Trading House”. As Metla pointed out, this follows from the audit report on the company’s annual accounts, which does not publicly disclose shareholders.
“Siberian Trading House” owns the Krasnoyarsk vodka plant, which produces vodka “Yarich”, “Duck Hunt” and others. Annual revenue – .823 million rubles.
Another asset of United Russia’s aunt is the Siberian Vodka Company (1.1 billion rubles). Here they produce, among others, vodka “The owner of the taiga”, “Sibspirtprom” and “Taiga dews”.
Another State Duma deputy is also connected with this alcohol business. The General Director of Siberian Trading House JSC is Anastasia Gorelkina, the wife of United Russia Anton Gorelkin.
According to Gorelkin’s declaration, Anastasia’s salary is almost 47 million a year.
There are several more deputies in the State Duma who lobby for the interests of the alcohol industry. Often we are even talking about introducing additional restrictions for weak alcohol in the interests of strong alcohol producers.
When there are players in the alcohol market in the State Duma, the attempts of other United Russia members to act as fighters for sobriety look especially comical. So, deputy Shamsail Saraliyev introduced bill to sell alcohol from 21but after a while he simply withdrew it.
Business Online, 01.10.2019, “Defence, beer, pharmacy and roads: what are deputies from Tatarstan lobbying in the State Duma?”: Chairman of the State Duma introduced 13 laws, of which 11 were adopted. Volodin’s interest groups, according to the authors of Transparency, are extensive: here are the National Guard, the FSB and the Russian Orthodox Church, and in addition, education and science, the alcohol and tobacco industries. […] In 2004, he promoted an amendment to establish a beer excise tax of 1.75 rubles per liter, “which led to an increase in excise taxes by only 8 kopecks, although the tax committee proposed to increase it to 3.65 rubles,” and on the same day, as part of A group of deputies came out in defense of Russian tobacco factories, British American Tobacco. All this allowed the authors of the report to attribute the speaker of the State Duma to the lobbyists of the alcohol and tobacco industries. — Inset K.ru
